


The Imperfect Heavens

by Juniper200



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Gen, M/M, Old Oak Doors, Science, Spoilers for episode 49B, hopeful
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-01
Updated: 2014-07-01
Packaged: 2018-02-06 22:37:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1875042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Juniper200/pseuds/Juniper200
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Carlos starts out with facts, because with facts, he knows where he stands.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Imperfect Heavens

The stars are very different here. Carlos isn’t an astronomer, but he knows his Big Dipper and his Southern Cross, and they are nowhere to be found. The pulsing beacon of the lighthouse is out, but the void-to-stars ratio is such that the desert is awash in ghostly light. The stars are stationary, though, and even if the little lights did move, there’s no Arby’s, no sensible-but-stylish hybrid coupe, no…

No.

Carlos starts out with facts, because with facts, he knows where he stands.

**1) He and Cecil are safe. Or as safe as anyone can be said to be in the face of an uncertain, dangerous existence.**

For the first time in a long time, Night Vale is safe, and Cecil is safe in it. He’s back in his element, the radio station, and soon he’ll be home safe in his own bed ( _Their_ home. _Their_ bed.) with nothing to fear except the usual array of night terrors, secret police and subdermal burrowing centipedes. 

As for Carlos, the desert seems empty of predators, Strex workers or anything else threatening. He has no idea where he actually is; there’s a chance he’s on some distant planet, looking back at Earth’s regular old stars from a different angle. But based on what he’s observed over the past few weeks and what Dana taught him today, he really is in another dimension not terribly distant from the one Cecil and Night Vale occupy. 

It occurs to Carlos that, if the _simplest_ explanation for his current situation is, “You’re on an alternate plane of existence that occasionally overlaps with your home universe,” he is living the scientific life _right_. 

Which reminds him:

**2) The multiverse is real!**

He’s trapped in an honest-to-god alternate universe, and that is _so cool_. Sure, he wasn’t the first to discover it (Hats off to Dana.) or the first to unlock its secrets (Well done, angry woman in a NVCR t-shirt.), but certainly he will be the first scientist to observe, measure, quantify, categorize, assess and, ultimately, publish groundbreaking journal articles about this dimension. It’s almost enough that he breaks into a triumphant little science dance, but the impulse reminds him of how much Cecil likes his triumphant science dances. Cecil’s approval usually leads to more dancing, and then to still more things Baptists don’t approve of.

 _Trapped in an alternate universe_ , a little voice in Carlos’ head whispers. He ignores it in favor of joyfully contemplating a possible lecture tour and humming a jaunty tune, because...

**3) Science got him into this.**

The line between universes, he reasons, is like the blood-brain barrier. The barrier is there to keep bad things (snake venom, Smiling Gods) away from something important and scientifically interesting (the brain, Night Vale). Sometimes, though, the barrier can’t tell the difference between the bad stuff and something beneficial (cancer drugs, Carlos) trying to get through.

The comparison is about to run away from Carlos (Is Cecil the the dura matter here, or is that the army of Erikas?), but before it does, he remembers a paper he read not long before he going through the old oak door in the House That Doesn’t Exist. Scientists were experimenting with high-frequency ultrasound to separate layers of the blood-brain barrier and move medicine across the line into the brain. It can be done; walls have doors, fences have gates, barriers can be crossed.

The barrier between universes is there to keep him out, but a determined scientist (and a scientist is always determined) can unlock the rules that govern the multiverse. Once you know the rules to something, it’s yours to command. Therefore…

**4) Science will get him out of this.**

He has a phone, an apparently limitless battery charge and pretty decent WiFi. Tesla never had any of those things (Well, maybe the limitless battery.) and look at how much he got done.

A less scientifically minded man might think of this as a comeuppance. After two years of trying to impose some order on Night Vale, Night Vale has gone and imposed its own order right back on him. But like any good scientist, Carlos knows that science is neither right nor wrong, neither vindictive nor benevolent. Science simply _is_. 

But if science has decided that Carlos can’t go back to Night Vale, then science _is_ wrong. Because science has not taken into account the most important fact of all, the fact that will propel him through the days (maybe weeks, a month at the outside) to come:

**5) Cecil belongs in Night Vale, and Carlos belongs with Cecil.**

The mutliverse doesn’t stand a chance.

**Author's Note:**

> Join me on [Tumblr](http://junietwohundred.tumblr.com).


End file.
